america votes tomorrow and neither candidate wants to look back and say i could have worked a little bit harder, i could have done a little bit more. they're packing on the campaign spots even tomorrow. >> it will be a pretty incredible 24 hours. you'll be here in ohio for all of i thanks for watching. see you back here live at 11:00. "anderson cooper" starts now. good evening, everyone. you might have heard there is an election tomorrow. you might have even heard it is straight from the candidates' mouths. they are everywhere today, the candidates. at least everywhere there's even the slightest doubt about tomorrow's outcome. the president in ohio, wisconsin and iowa. governor romney in florida, virginia, ohio and new hampshire. running mates and surrogates also dotting the swing state map. governor romney's got kid rock, bruce springsteen is campaigning with the president, but in the end, it is down to the candidates and often to the candidates' last vocal cord. >> now's the time to keep pressing forward. educate our kids and train new workers. bring troops home.

care for our veterans. broaden opportunity. grow our middle class. restore our democracy mange sure that no matter who you are, no matter where you come from, no matter how you started out, no matter what your last name is, you can make it here in america if you try. wisconsin, that's why i need your vote. and if you're willing to work with me again and knock on some doors with me, make some phone calls for me, turn out for me, we'll win wisconsin. we'll win this election. >> he can't change washington from the inside, only from the outside. we're going to give him that chance in a day or two. >> millions of people have already voted for one candidate or the other. early voting, though, has been a blessing and a curse. in ohio, in florida, limited hours made for long lines over the weekend, could make for post-election legal battles if either state is pivotal and

close. a very real possibility. there is a lot of excitement out there, though, tonight. we are just hours away from the final day of this election, of this campaign. it's up to you now, the voters, to decide. we are going to try to bring you all the excitement and energy that is out there tonight with live remarks from the presidential candidates and vice presidential candidates as they make them. tonight in the hour ahead and again when we're live at 10:00. the polling remains close enough that the romney campaign has secured two rallies for tomorrow, election day, one in cleveland, ohio. the other in pittsburgh, pennsylvania. in cleveland, you would expect, given the polling. pittsburgh, not so much. we will talk about that. here are the latest from the map. john king? >> a lot of question marks the eve of the election. parallel universes if you talk to the campaigns. the obama campaign says we will win most if not all of the battleground states. you don't get much of an argument from the republicans when you say the president will carry nevada. some republicans push back but let's give nevada to the

president. hypothetical here, folks. that would put the president at 243 to 206. you need 270 to win. let's see if romney can find the magic to get to 270. the state of iowa, the president will end there. that's his final rally. the president with a lead there. it's small. the romney campaign says it's still in play but the president has consistently led by a small margin. you will see more and more of that across the midwest. you mentioned governor romney going to cleveland tomorrow. let's look at the latest polling in ohio. no republican ever won the white house without it. mathematically can he get there without it, yes. is it probable, no. here's the latest poll of polls. cnn putting together the average of seven public polls, 50-47. so a very competitive race but again, the president has consistently been ahead by a couple in ohio. governor romney needs to win on the ground and win big on the ground tomorrow to carry that state. in a close election like this, sometimes the little guys matter. new hampshire is one of the little guys. only four electoral votes. a new poll out by the university of new hampshire today, a

three-point race in new hampshire. this one actually could be decisive. i know it's only four but we might be watching tiny new hampshire tomorrow night as we go. the only way we will be watching is if governor romney can somehow find the magic in virginia. he has to win this one. new poll out today has it at 48-47, that's a statistical tie. watch the washington suburbs early tomorrow night, if governor romney can do better than john mccain in this part of the state right here, that means he could be in place because mccain and obama tied in the rest of the state last year. this part is key. then you move down here to the state of florida. again, governor romney has to have it. let's look here. you see here's one recent poll, 49-47. that's the "wall street journal"/marist poll with the president on top by two points. that's a statistical tie but if president's on top yet. mason-dixon poll has governor romney on top, so 29 electoral votes down there in florida. governor romney has to have florida. he has to have virginia. we didn't talk about colorado. that's another one that's in his mix. wisconsin, another battleground state. the president, you have to say, has the edge because he has been consistently a little ahead in most of the battleground states

but the romney campaign says it has the enthusiasm on its side and can change things tomorrow. in 24 hours we will start to find out. >> we certainly will. thanks. i want to bring in the rest of the panel. david gergen, gloria borger, candy crowley, host of cnn's "state of the union" and moderator of the second presidential debate. you heard what john just laid out. what's your gut tell you? >> my gut tells me that contrary to what we normally see, normally in a final weekend, the electorate starts to break slightly towards the challenger. this weekend, it seems to be breaking for president obama. >> you think that's storm related? >> i think there's a hurricane lift, yes, i do. i thought last week was a very good one for him. he gained a little bit of an edge. that means he's favored, but romney can still pull off this upset. it is so very much within his power. he's got a lot of enthusiasm on the ground. >> i hear from a lot of romney people who say they just don't buy the polls. they think there's enthusiasm and energy out there. >> well, they say that their internal polls are much more

accurate than our polls and they say that they're tighter, that states where we might show president obama up by a couple of points, anderson, they show it absolutely a dead heat, such as ohio would be one of those examples. and you know, we at cnn have had some calls with the campaigns today. the obama campaign, it's so clear, has this down, this get out the vote effort to an absolute science. it's very clear to me that while the romney people are better than the mccain people were, they're much more relying on emotion and enthusiasm than they are on the absolute science of getting out the vote. although as i say, they're spending a lot of money doing that as well. >> candy, governor romney will be voting tomorrow, belmont, massachusetts. not far from where you are in boston. he will also campaign in ohio and pennsylvania, a state that hasn't voted for a republican presidential nominee since george bush senior, back in '88. what does that tell you? is that a hail mary backup in case he loses ohio or just worth a try since he's in the neighborhood or does he think he

really has a chance? >> it depends on who you ask, anderson. clearly the polls have tightened up in pennsylvania. they took a look at it, when you talk to the folks in the romney campaign they say listen, we have spent the money, we need to spend in all these battleground states that john was talking about. all of our resources that we can put in there are there. we are up on the air as much as we can be. there's no more room for ads on tv in all these battleground states and they took a look at pennsylvania and said first of all, it's right next door to ohio so not like they have to go across the country to go there. plus more than 90% of pennsylvanians will vote on election day. there's no early voting in pennsylvania. absentees, you have to meet a certain criteria so the vast majority of pennsylvanians will vote on election day. what a quaint notion. they looked at that and looked at the polls going in and also realized that in pennsylvania,

mitt romney has not been so defined by the obama campaign as he has in ohio and all the other swing states. they haven't had that kind of advertising so they thought it was worth, you know, a throw. do they think they're going to win it, they talk awfully optimistically but this is more hey, let's go here, let's take a flyer here. there's nothing wrong with looking for a backup. >> stay with us, everyone. joining me right now from boston is romney communications director. appreciate you being with us. governor needs to win all the swing states in play to have a shot at the white house. the president needs to win one or two. is governor romney the underdog, in your opinion? >> we want to do well wherever our name is on the ballot and we believe we can do well in all the swing states. the fact is this is going to be a very close race. i can tell you that the enthusiasm that we're seeing on the trail not only at our events in the states but also at our victory centers across the country, they're just brimming with volunteers who are excited

to help governor romney get his message out and get people to the polls tomorrow. one thing i just heard your panel talk about is the get out the vote effort that the obama campaign has, and i heard one of your panelists suggest that ours is not as sophisticated. i would respectfully disagree with that, of course. what we have in our campaign is a very sophisticated get out the vote effort that we will be moving with tomorrow. in boston we will have 800 volunteers in a war room who will be taking incoming information from 34,000 volunteers that are out in the states and these people are going to be at the prezingts, at the polls and they will be gathering very important data so we can see where we are overperforming and underperforming. not so we can see what the out come of the race is going to be, but so we can make adjustments and get people out to support romney. >> i want to bring in john king because i know he has questions for you as well. >> let's look at the map.

i just want you to rank them, every campaign you mentioned all those volunteers. i have been traveling and i agree with you, if you go to campaign victory centers in a place like colorado or ohio, where i have been in the last week, there is no question there's a lot more energy now than there was in 2008, in the final days of the mccain campaign. but if you had to rank them, most democrats and even most republicans in nevada think the president will get that one. if you want to argue with me, please do. tell me why. when you look at the map, you go from colorado, nine electoral votes. iowa, six electoral votes. let's just start there. in iowa, it's a close state. republicans have improved their registration dramatically in the last couple years yet the president has consistently led by two to three, four, five points. how does governor romney get iowa? >> let me tell you, let me just give you some numbers. the first one is 23 million. that's the number of people in this country who are still struggling to find work. the next one is 7.9. unemployment in this country is higher today than -- >> the question was about iowa. the question is about iowa. >> i understand what the question was but it goes to

message. the reason that governor romney is going to win in these states and ultimately become the next president is because he has a positive optimistic vision for the future and he has been explaining that. president obama doesn't. he's been campaigning on small ideas and petty attacks and he's encouraging his voters to get out for revenge. governor romney is encouraging our voters to get out for love of country. he wants to bring people together -- >> can we just avoid the talking points at this point? we're one day before the election. john asked a very specific question about iowa. if you want to answer, that would be great. >> well, they're not talking points, anderson. i would disagree with that. this is exactly what the campaign is going to come down to. it's what this message is going to come down to, whether we want four more years of the last four years -- >> you don't want to talk about iowa? >> what's your question about iowa? >> john? >> the question was republicans have come up to parity in registration yet the president, i can show you the numbers if you want, this is one of those midwestern states that despite all the activity in the

campaigns, the president has managed somehow to keep usually it's three, four, five points. do you really think, in some states you can overcome one or two points on election day. if it's five, can you overcome that on the ground in a state like iowa on election day? >> i think so. we feel optimistic about iowa just like we do ohio. i think that we did get the des moines register endorsement, you saw that. that was a good get for us. but i think that tomorrow as we continue this get out the vote effort, you are going to see us overperform in those areas that are very strong and president obama continue to underperform in the areas where he has traditionally been strong. so at the end of the day we feel very good about iowa. i would say the same thing about ohio and colorado, in fact. and i heard you mention earlier that we are going to be campaigning in ohio tomorrow, a very important state, but also pennsylvania, a new state that's on your map. >> appreciate it. gail, let's bring in our partisan pros. ari fleischer and eric erickson.

on the left, obama 2012 pollster cornel belcher. paul, let's start with u everybody is focused on ohio. do you see a road map for mitt romney if he does not win ohio? >> no. no. romney has -- i'm not a big fan of the electoral college but the founding fathers gave it to us. romney has a much, much tougher map. if you begin as you should presuming he will carry every state john mccain did, then he still needs indiana, which he'll almost -- he's very strong in, very likely to win. north carolina which is easier than many of the other swing states but not in the bag. then it gets hard. he's got to have ohio. even if he gets ohio, get this, he's got to still win virginia or florida -- and florida, colorado. it's so hard for him to get to 270. without ohio, it's almost impossible. >> cornel, do you see this boiling down to the electoral college versus the popular vote? >> i think it is going to be

electoral college. one of the interesting things, i think you'll see a tighter race state by state. on average, we won the battleground states by seven or eight points last time around in 2008. we won't win by those on average, eight or seven points, this time around. you'll see closer races in each of these states but as they line up, the president has leads in all of these states. the structure of this election has been fairly solid with him leading in all these states. i think you will see close state by state races. the electoral college i think will be a decisive victory for the president. >> ari, are you one of these folks who said there's polling, there's polling, but your gut is telling you romney based on t enthusiasm on the ground? >> first, listen to the polling, we might as well cancel the election tomorrow. romney can't get to 270. he can't get there without ohio. here's the other way to look at the same country paul was looking at. mccain numbers for romney gets him 179 electoral votes, 22 states. throw in indiana, north carolina, florida, which i think romney's got florida, virginia, that's the close one right there, and don't forget nebraska

is one. obama got one in nebraska. that goes romney. that's 248. after 248, if he gets colorado, new hampshire and wisconsin, he's the next president of the united states. of course, if he gets ohio, it's even a bigger margin. all those states are absolutely possible. every one of the states is possible. >> did you just say if your aunt had a mustache we would call her your uncle? >> yes. >> i got to think about that. [ speaking simultaneously ] >> quickly, your gut? >> my gut says pepto bismol. i don't think anyone knows right now, it's so close. you look at ohio, republicans typically go two percentage points over what the polls say, democrats typically goes two points behind. that puts them 49-49 in ohio. that comes down to the ground game. >> we'll take a quick break. we'll have more with our panel now and in the 10:00 hour. we will take a break and figure

out whether paul's aunt is his uncle. a lot of -- really want to bring you the energy what's happening out there right now. president obama back in the state that really launched his first presidential campaign, iowa. he's counting on it again to close out his last campaign with a win. details ahead.

how did i get here? dumb luck? or good decisions? ones i've made. ones we've all made. about marriage. children. money. about tomorrow.

here's to good decisions. who matters most to you says the most about you. massmutual is owned by our policyholders so they matter most to us. massmutual. we'll help you get there. or that printing in color had to cost a fortune. nobody said an all-in-one had to be bulky. or that you had to print from your desk. at least, nobody said it to us. introducing the business smart

inkjet all-in-one series from brother. easy to use, it's the ultimate combination of speed, small size, and low-cost printing. i want you to work with me again. knock on some doors with me and make some phone calls and turn out. we will win ohio. we'll win this election. we'll finish what we started. we'll renew those ties that bind us together and reaffirm the spirit that makes the united states of america the greatest nation on earth. god bless you, ohio.

>> president obama earlier today in columbus, ohio at a rally with bruce springsteen, jay-z, also mitt romney stopping in columbus just a few hours later. paul ryan is in vienna, ohio later tonight. governor romney is in cleveland tomorrow. president obama appearing tomorrow in ohio. deputy campaign manager stephanie cutter joins us now. your team keeps saying the governor is in pennsylvania now out of desperation but if he's got no shot there, why has your campaign been sending president clinton to pennsylvania in the home stretch? if the state is not in play, couldn't that time be put to better use somewhere else? >> well, president clinton has traveled through every single battleground state for us. we are enormously thankful. but we're not taking anything for granted. you know, pennsylvania has tightened, absolutely. if i were working on the romney campaign i would probably be giving it a shot, too. >> you don't think it's desperation for the romney campaign to go there? >> well, i think that -- well, you know, i did notice that their super pac admitted

yesterday that the reason that they went in there is because they didn't have anywhere else to spend money. so they don't have a route to 270 through ohio. they're behind in ohio. we have a significant early vote program. we're beating them by two to one in the early vote. we're ahead in the polls. so they don't have a route to 270 so they are now sending out lifelines to pennsylvania, minnesota, we'll see if they can get there. >> let me ask you about that early vote. because republicans are saying look, back in 2008, democrats had huge early voting leads. republicans made up a lot of the difference on election day. this time, the early vote advantage for democrats is much smaller. republicans are saying it's small enough that if they just do as well tomorrow as they did on election day in 2008, they win. do they have a point? >> no. because they're not looking at accurate numbers. we do have a significant margin in particularly the ohio early vote. and you know, we're not running a 2008 campaign. we're running a 2012 campaign.

we're running -- >> do you wish you were running a 2008 campaign because you did pretty well. >> well, yes. but that's four years ago. we're a day out from election day so here we are in 2012. you know, we've invested heavily in the early vote and we are beating mitt romney with pretty high margins. according to some public polls, just looking at the public data out there, he'll have to turn out a six to ten point advantage on election day. that's going to be really tough for him. that's a herculean effort. the bottom line is this is going to be a close race. we're not taking anything for granted. >> i want to bring in john king because he's much smarter than i am and has the magic wall. >> let's stick with honesty. you said you would rather be running 2008. if you talked to democrats, you look at the toss-up battleground states, they say the president is confident about nevada, because there's a latino vote. i will give you nevada as your best of the battleground states. what's your worst? what are you most worried about? >> well, you know, john, somebody was quoted yesterday as

saying that's like choosing between our children. >> so choose. >> we are tied or -- i'm not going to do that. we're tied or ahead in every single battleground state. certainly some of them are tighter than others. north carolina is extremely tight. but we're pleased with where we are going into election day. we have advantage on the early vote. we've done significant work with voter registration in that state. we're close in florida. again, significant advantage on early vote. and done a lot of work on voter registration. >> can i run that through the universal political translator and say you're most worried about north carolina and florida? >> those are your words. >> let me bring in david gergen. he's also got a question. >> stephanie, good to see you. tell us what three things we should be looking for tomorrow night as a sense of which way it's going. what are you going to be looking for? >> well, you know, it's important to understand that because there has been so much early voting, some states, half of the vote is in. colorado will probably be about

80%, that the early exit polls are not going to accurately reflect where the vote is. so everybody should stay calm throughout the day, let the day go on and get to those late exit polls and take a look at where we are there. >> so the first exit polls you shouldn't take it seriously as the latter ones? >> no. >> we have seen that before, right? >> yes, we have. and of course, we know how things work going from east to west. virginia will be one of the early ones. ohio, you will have a sense of what's happening in ohio early tomorrow evening. so i would be looking at what's happening in those states. certainly if we win virginia, that's a very good sign moving west. but you know, i think it's probably going to be a late night. >> yeah. no doubt about that. stephanie, appreciate you joining us. chief white house correspondent jessica yellin is traveling with the president. she joins us. jessica, the president's wrapping up his campaign in iowa. which is only six electoral votes but there's a nostalgic

reason for this last stop. explain that. >> reporter: hi, anderson. yes. back in iowa where i spent many a night talking to you four years ago, freezing here because president obama slugged it out with then senator hillary clinton day after day in a primary that the obama campaign says is where it all started. so he's wrapping it up here for not only the last event of this presidential election, but really, the last campaign event of his career, of his life. and he is going to rally here in front of -- you can't really see it but it is the obama 2008 headquarters toys my left and he will be speaking in front of it, and they say it's where it all started. now, this also happens to be a battleground state and a state that you just heard stephanie cutter say the campaign feels they're ahead but that they do have to win and every little state counts as john was saying earlier. so the president campaigning, four important votes but i will

point out that not only will he be here, he will also be with bruce springsteen and mrs. obama and he will be with some old, sort of the old band getting back together, some old campaign hands who dropped off out of the white house, are back with him for this last event, and none of them are shaving. they're all growing their beards out because it was the campaign tradition last time around. >> how do we know if the early vote theory holds? >> reporter: you were all talking about that. one of the things i think you can watch for tomorrow that i'll be watching for is north carolina and florida. those are two states where polling is shown that governor romney is either ahead or tied with the president. in florida, there are some polls that show the president is ahead but where early vote totals show the president ahead, in the early vote, even though the polling shows governor romney should win the states. now, if the vote totals are showing that it's sort of a dead heat between the two of them, we can look at that vote total and see that actually, the obama

campaign's early vote theory is holding through the night and maybe we can extrapolate that to the rest of the theory. if the early numbers are showing that governor romney's pulling ahead in north carolina and florida, that could be an indication that this whole early vote theory ain't going to hold so much water in the end. something to watch for. >> thanks very much. up next, not just swing states but swing counties. could make all the difference tonight. oh, yeah, we will talk about counties. john king maps it out ahead. [ male announcer ] this is sheldon, whose long dy setting up the news starts with arthritis pain and a choice. take tylenol or take aleve, the #1 recommended pain reliever by orthopedic doctors.

just two aleve can keep pain away all day. back to the news. just two aleve can keep pain away all day. alriwoah! did you get that? and...flip! yep, look at this. it takes like 20 pictures at a time. i never miss anything. isn't that awesome? uh that's really cool. you should upload these. i know, right? that is really amazing. the pictures are so clear. kevin's a handsome devil that phone does everything! search dog tricks. okay, see if we can teach him something cool. look at how lazy kevin is.

kevin, get it together dude cmon, kevin take 20 pictures with burst shot on the galaxy s3.

i need your vote. i need your work. walk with me. let's walk together. tomorrow is a new beginning. tomorrow we begin a new tomorrow. god bless each of you. thank you so very much. virginia is going to help me become the next president of the united states. thank you so much. >> mitt romney there speaking at a very enthusiastic rally in fairfax, virginia today. we have to get down to what's

happening county by county to really get a sense of what's at play. john king is at the magic wall. >> where you just showed governor romney says a lot about this election. if ohio is ground zero, virginia might be ground subzero. if romney doesn't win virginia, probably doesn't matter what happens in ohio. where was he? right here in the northern virginia suburbs. you see fairfax right there. when president obama carried the state four years ago, he won it by 234,000 votes. guess what his margin was in these three counties closest to washington, d.c.? 234,000 votes. john mccain and president obama tied in the rest of virginia. northern virginia makes the difference in the close-in suburbs. let me show you why. prince william county, for example, governor romney was in fairfax county. prince william county, little more conservative, 58% to 42%. four years ago, let's go back to when george w. bush carried the state. he won that county. if you came into fairfax county eight years ago, george w. bush lost the county but look at the margin. a much bigger margin for president obama. these close-in northern virginia

suburbs where the people are, that's where most of the population growth is. governor romney doesn't have to win them, just has to get much closer than john mccain did four years ago. that's in the state of virginia. let's pick another one. we talk about how busy and important ohio is going to be. if you want to look at a couple of places in ohio, i will circle them for you. let's take two. one in the northeast corner, one in the southwest corner. what's in the northeast corner? lake county just outside cleveland. this is the suburbs. close presidential elections are won in the suburbs in america. in lake county, it's 2% of the population but there are people like this throughout this battleground state. you see the president with a very narrow victory when george w. bush carried the state, he had a very narrow victory here. you win the close ones in the suburbs, that's in the northeast corner. look down here. 2004, hamilton county. that's where you find cincinnati. african-americans in the city more suburban and exurban as you head out this way, that's blue. in 2004, george w. bush wins hamilton county, he wins ohio. that's 2008. it's blue -- i said it was blue

before. it was red in 2004, blue in 2008. watch hamilton county and watch lake county, a few others we'll get to tomorrow in the state of ohio. let's just go west. give you one more example. you come to this battleground here, you look again, i will make the same point. here's denver, the major population center. just below denver, you have arapahoe county. you come over here to jefferson county, 12% of the population right here. the major suburbs just around the denver area, you're looking at 2008, there you're looking at 2004. that's where the elections are won, close presidential elections. governor romney needs to win big in rural areas. the president needs to win big in urban areas. all things being equal if that happens, the president gets the urban areas, governor romney gets the rural areas, then the suburbs will win this election and we'll watch the counties all night long. >> as a programming note since we will be looking at ohio so closely so people want to plan out their viewing schedule and/or drinking schedule, historically, when do we start to get results from some of the

important counties in ohio? when do you think we can get a sense of what's happening? >> they tend to come in pretty quickly. it can always be glitches on election night but a lot of these places where you've had heavy early voting, i was just in colorado, for example, and ohio as well, a lot of places where you had early heavy voting, in colorado they start counting the votes. they don't hit the tabulate button until tomorrow. in ohio they start counting on election day so some results come in pretty quickly. then you go from there. we have been through this before. one of the things that almost always happens in close ohio elections is you're waiting for cuyahoga county. that's urban, that's cleveland. that will be telling. i say watch the suburbs. if african-american turnout is way down in cleveland, governor romney doesn't need as much in the suburbs. results tend to come in, this state closes early. ohio closes very early, 7:30. then the 8:00 states on the east coast, virginia being most important among them, i would argue, will start to get some results pretty quickly. the question is, if it's very close, we'll have to see where we don't have votes. sometimes the biggest challenge

on election night is not to find out where the votes you have, it's to find the votes you don't have. >> right. john, stay with us. want to bring our analyst, nonpartisans, david bergen, gloria borger, candy crowley is with us, paul begala and cornel belcher. ari, you were talking about early voting. >> yeah. the best way to know who's going to win is the enthusiasm. no question that's what we have to measure on tuesday night. it's down for the president. the question is how much. let's go to ohio. mitt romney has got 100,000 more early votes than john mccain did at this point. president obama has 150,000 fewer votes than he did at this point four years ago. that's a net 250,000 pickup for romney in a state that the president won by 260,000 votes. florida. 270,000 change in the direction of romney and the republicans because of the increase for romney over mccain, decrease for obama in early voting. 270,000 change in a state that obama won by 236,000. this is what it comes down to. this is why it is so real that

there's a path to 270 for mitt romney. it's because of that decline in enthusiasm compared to four years ago and i also say the polls continue, you look at poll after poll, in ohio we talked about earlier, to oversample republicans. there was a ppp poll in iowa that just came out showing the president is up by two points or by one point. it's because they oversampled democrats by two. >> do you guys buy that? >> i think there's a lot of back and forth about ohio. it's tough in the states where you don't have voter registration. we can make an argument but let's go out west, take a state like nevada where we actually can look at registration. right now the president has twice as many voters already banked in a state like nevada than he did last time around. so i don't buy the enthusiasm gap because actually if it was an enthusiasm gap, you would see it in states where there was -- >> how do you respond to what he actually said about ohio -- >> my point about ohio, we can argue back and forth about ohio but there's no actual prior

registration so if you look at the counties where sort of the president has done well versus the counties that they have done well, his numbers don't add up. so where there's not registration, it is harder to look at because -- >> where we know there is registration like nevada, the president has twice -- [ speaking simultaneously ] >> but ohio is publicly recorded data. they do have that. >> no, they don't have voter registration in ohio. >> -- for the president matches what it was in 2008 -- >> enthusiasm for no one is ever going to match what it was in 2008. >> right. okay. >>is in the polls, cornel. that's the issue. all the polls show the democrats are turning out six, seven, eight points over republicans. >> first of all, enthusiasm does matter. it really does. but arithmetic matters more. if you have fewer voters but they're really, really, really fired up, you still lose. i think that's what's going on here. when you've had -- they're narrow leads but they have been so stable for so long, they all

can't be wrong. it's close but it's not too close to call. when democracy course stan greenberg released a poll today, a national poll, showed the president ahead by four. it's hard to measure enthusiasm but the thing i looked for in that poll was young voters. that's where enthusiasm matters the most to me. i've seen no data or anecdotes that suggest african americans are going to drop off in enthusiasm or that latinos will but young people, that's my worry on enthusiasm. in greenberg's poll, he only had young people as 15% of the electorate, 17% in 2008 and still has the president up by four. so you have some diminution if you're a democrat, you're worried about diminution of the youth vote. >> let's take a quick break. we got a lot ahead. we are trying to follow any candidates who are making speeches in this hour or the 10:00 hour. we will bring them to you live. thanks everyone. one of the wild cards that could have an impact on the election

is super storm sandy. will voters in ravaged areas be able to cast votes tomorrow? officials are scrambling to try to make it easier. we'll take a look at that ahead.

we'rwith questions fromtump sombing elections.kies do you know where your polling place is? maybe somewhere around my house. mine's just, right over that way. well you can find out exactly where it is using bing elections. it's a good day for politics. which way do you lean politically? conservative. republican. well, using the bing news selector you can find news from whichever way you lean. (together) social on this side, financial. which party is currently predicted to win a majority in the senate? the republicans? would you make a bet on that? no. are you chicken?

to me this election's fairly simple. who's more likely to restore the middle class, to give poor people a chance to work their way into it, to build a 21st century american economy with the good jobs of tomorrow? i think it's the candidate that got off the campaign trail and went to work on hurricane sandy with republicans and democrats alike. >> former president bill clinton earlier today in pittsburgh, just one stop he made on a

whirlwind day of campaigning. late word tonight that secretary of homeland security janet napolitano will visit nassau county, new york, on new york's long island, tomorrow to assess storm response and recovery efforts and to meet with state and local officials. there's been a lot of criticism about the response out on long island. one week ago when the storm was unleashing its wrath on the northeast we didn't know how bad the damage would be. tonight, one million people in the region still without power. thousands have been displaced from their homes. tens of thousands, the loss in damage sandy left in its wake is immense. its impact still really unfolding. voter turnout in a presidential election tomorrow could be affected. storm ravaged areas are obviously responding in a variety of different ways. in new jersey, you have storm victims who will be allowed to vote by e-mail or fax. the first time the state's allowed that to happen, by the way. new york's governor andrew cuomo is signing an executive order allowing people displaced by the storm to go to any approximate polling place, their words, sign an affidavit and be able to vote by ballot from that location. despite that scramble, to try to

make it easier to vote, an obvious question remains in areas that are so hard hit can voters even focus on the election? will they actually go out and vote when you don't have a home left. deborah feyerick joins me from staten island which took a huge hit from the storm. you have been in some of the most devastated parts of new york state today. how is it ever going to help victims especially as thousands are homeless and temperatures are really plummeting and you have this other storm on the way. >> reporter: that is really the big question. because we were driving all along part of staten island. we can tell you that home after home, it's completely ruined. they are being gutted now. that's the only thing residents can do. imagine losing the entire first floor of all your possessions, all your belongings, not just the couches, not just the rugs and clothing and shoes but also the floorboards and the walls. people are gutting it because for three days they had water that was really over my head in their homes and there is so much -- mold will be such a problem that all they can do is gut it. volunteers are coming to help

people basically clear out their homes. i want to tell you something. sanitation trucks, garbage trucks from new york city actually working 24 hours around the clock. on some blocks we saw eight sanitation trucks. that's how many are needed, block by block, because there is so much garbage and debris, as you know. we see here a lot of people are coming, bringing clothing to meebl. others are taking that clothing, taking clothing, taking blankets, taking coats, especially, because it is just so cold. whether somebody is going to be able to vote, some people are saying yes. of course they are going to vote. others are saying they're so overwhelmed that even if they could find their polling place, chances are, they're not going to get there. of course, as you know, if 25% of the voting public doesn't show up, they may extend voting in these areas for another day. >> deb, appreciate that. so tough right now in staten island and elsewhere. nassau county, suffolk county, long island. when it comes to the election there's a legal storm brewing.

the first lawsuits have already been filed. you probably know in ohio, over how provisional ballots will be counted. in florida, over the deadline for early voting. two states obviously where the polls show a very close race and that could end up being a legal mine field. i think everyone is hoping we don't see a repeat of what happened in florida in 2000. joining me is cnn senior legal analyst jeffrey tuben. seems if anyplace has the potential to be a repeat of florida, it's ohio. the polls are obviously closed and if the margin of votes is narrow enough it comes down to provisional ballots and right now, that seems ripe for a legal challenge. explain. >> well, provisional ballots are what voters fill out if when they go to vote, their registration is off. there's some problem. they don't have the right i.d., they're not in the right district. so the voting authorities, they give them what's called a provisional ballot. they fill it out and then that's put in an envelope. four years ago, there were 200,000 provisional ballots. there are expected to be at least that many this year. if in a close race the

provisional ballots could spell the difference, listen to this, anderson, it's ten days until they open the provisional ballots. during those ten days, the individuals who cast the provisional ballots can go to the voting places and say look, here's my i.d., here's why my vote is legitimate. imagine both campaigns organizing thousands of provisional ballot voters to go to the polling places over the next ten days. >> i'm not standing in this room for ten days. i'm just saying that right now. just putting that out there. let's be honest. the lawyers are ready if the election in 2000 taught us anything, they must have van loads of lawyers circles. >> it's in the thousands. >> thousands of lawyers already. >> talk about a frightening sight -- thought in and of itself. but in 2000 it was sort of a big improvisation. neither side was ready.

james baker for the republicans, warren christopher for the democrats were sort of brought in at the last minute. not this time. they are both locked and loaded with lawyers, guns and money and it is really, it could happen tomorrow that we start seeing lawsuits about keeping ballots frozen and you know, they're ready to go. >> jeff, we'll be in close contact with you. thank you very much. tonight, joe biden and paul ryan are making their final push through battleground states. final night of campaigning before the polls open. we'll tell you where they are and how they're trying to close the deal for their candidate, ahead.

i'm an expert on softball. and tea parties. i'll have more awkward conversations than i'm equipped for because i'm raising two girls on my own. i'll worry about the economy more than a few times before they're grown. but it's for them, so i've found a way. who matters most to you says the most about you. massmutual is owned by our policyholders so they matter most to us. massmutual. we'll help you get there.

the potential of yelp unlocked. nyse euronext. unlocking the world's potential. to a currency market for everyone. the potential of fxcm unlocked. nyse euronext. unlocking the world's potential. perform, compete and grow. and people are driving this change. that's the power of human resources. the society... for human resource management and its members know... how to harness that power, because we help develop it.

from the next economy, to the next generation, we help get... the most out of business, by getting the best out of people. shrm. leading people, leading organizations. that is the kind of leadership we need right now. common sense leadership, get things done, stop blaming people and don't try to transform this country into something it was

never intended to be. that's who we are. that's why we need your help. that's why we have momentum. that's why we're going to win and that's why we only have one more day before we get us on the right track. >> paul ryan obviously today making the case. joe biden spoke earlier tonight in richmond, virginia. want to go back to our panelists, partisan and nonpartisan alike. i got to bring up something which has sort of emerged over the last day or so. "60 minutes" did an interview with president obama that aired weeks ago. a piece of it which they never aired, steve cross asked him directly about the attacks in benghazi. this was just hours after his rose garden speech, just days after the attack. i want to play this sound bite which they just released yesterday, cbs news. >> mr. president, this morning you went out of your way to avoid the use of the word

terrorism in connection with the libya attack. >> right. >> do you believe that this was a terrorist attack? >> well, it's too early to know exactly how this came about, what group was involved, but obviously, it was an attack on americans. >> there's obviously a lot of questions about why this wasn't released earlier, even if it happened do you think it makes any difference? because you can look at that just as people looked at the rose garden speech and you can say well, he didn't answer it directly, he didn't say this wasn't a terrorist attack, but he also didn't say it was. >> it's too late. i think that's why it's been released now. what's shocking about this, that interview was september 12th, the same day the president went to the rose garden, as was the big issue in the second debate, did he or did he not say specifically what took place in benghazi was terrorism. why is "60 minutes" only releasing this now? why did they sit on it? why didn't they release it the morning after the second debate when it was topical, relevant and would have been significant news? this is journalistic

malpractice. they sat on the news. >> cornel? >> first up, the premise of the question is factually flawed. he said you went out of your way not to call it terrorism. the president was either too polite, too distracted, too tired, i don't know, but in the debate he corrected the record right away when romney said you didn't call it terror. he jumped him because he did. when mr. cross asked him that, i would say you have to correct it right there. i have no idea why -- they should have released it. it's no too late. they don't start to vote until tomorrow. i have a hard time seeing that swinging anybody's vote. >> they should see it. here's my problem with the whole benghazi thing. whether the president knew or did not know, i've just got to say if george bush had gotten on a plane and gone to a campaign event in las vegas, nevada that morning as the corpse of the ambassador being dragged through the streets of benghazi, i think most of the major american media would have crucified george w. bush and it didn't happen with barack obama. i think that is an example of media bias. >> i want to bring in candy

crowley. candy, obviously you were involved in the debate where this became a huge issue. were you surprised that this tape wasn't released after that debate, after it was a huge issue? >> you know, i don't know. because i don't know what their rationale was. i'm assuming it didn't -- i mean, i read that it did not play in the portions that they put out there. did they -- you know, sometimes when we do interviews, we put the whole interview up on the website. i'm assuming that's what happened in this case. since it was so relevant -- >> that's not the case. >> one would think they would put it up. i don't know whether they do put it up in general. i just am not privy at all to cbs' thinking on it. >> right. >> i echo to some degree ari's view. they clearly should have put it out the day after the debate. let the voters decide what it means. we don't have to litigate that question but voters deserve to know that. when it was relevant. >> but the interesting thing

about the debates where this did come up is that mitt romney, who was expected to aggressively go after the president on the issue of benghazi and what happened and what he knew and when he knew it and whether he was honest with the american people, mitt romney did not do that for whatever reason. i'm talking about the campaign. >> that's changing the subject. >> we still have a lot more to cover. we will see most of you again at 10:00. i hope you join us again at 10:00. we'll be right back. up your game. up the ante. and if you stumble, you get back up. up isn't easy, and we ought to know. we're in the business of up. everyday delta flies a quarter of million people while investing billions improving everything from booking to baggage claim. we're raising the bar on flying and tomorrow we will up it yet again.